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Where is this marriage covenant doctrine taught in the Bible?
Does that necessarily imply a covenant?
I can agree to give you my sheep, that would be a covenant. It might have some other stipulations. But I could just give you a sheep with no stipulations and no covenant. Right?
What about cases with no father?
I’m not a fan of basing doctrine on the exceptions... but my understanding is if she is a free woman then she is her own authority. Ruth for instance... if she is a slave wife then whom ever is her master would be the decision maker and would form the covenant...
This is the best point I've seen in this debate in a long time. Excellent.
No it's not. We've done this before too. The covenant in this verse had nothing to do with forming the marriage.
I agree entirely that there is not an absolute that every human marriage must have one. We are in agreement on that.
You will not find a Biblical mandate for a vow. There are multiple ways Biblically exampled to create a marriage.
And how would this help? Were the Hebrews all sinless? Was their culture perfect? Do you have an inspired history book? How are we to know these cultural practices have been preserved accurately? I can think of very few things less helpful to this debate than the modern books that claim to accurately relate to us Hebrew culture. How would they even separate the Hebrews righteous periods from the unrighteous. This is a ridiculous claim.
Where are those things required? There certainly wasn't any engagement in the Garden.
Lol, it might also help to talk about how God defines covenant.
They aren’t required. But they are examples of covenant... some agreement to create a new family unit has to be present. Formal or informal. In writing or verbal or even simply implied...
See my post #26 They are not a requirement.
And yet God doesnt say that she is his until after he covenants with her.
Jacob thought he was marrying Rachel, we don't know what precise form that agreement took, and it may well have not applied to Leah at all. They may have had no covenant when he slept with her.
BUT, once he figured out who she was, he had now taken her virginity and had an obligation to keep her anyway - to agree to take her from her father and have her as his wife. That agreement with her father, whether spoken or unspoken, and despite being entered unwillingly, was still an agreement or covenant. By contrast, if he had run off the next morning and abandoned Leah, he'd have slept with her without taking her as a wife as he was obliged to do - and sinning.
So in Leah's case, sex came first, agreement / covenant came second.
In Rachel's case, the agreement came first (entered into honestly and openly), sex came second.
Both ways formed equally valid marriages.
A clear example of a covenant between equals would be the one between David and Jonathan.
This position makes the issue of a marriage covenant irrelevant to a marriage discussion. It also renders baseless the argument of sexless fornication. After all that position was based on a violation of a marriage covenant.
A wife might have stipulated that she would cook every night in such a marriage covenant. The night she doesn't she violated that covenant, but no one would argue she violated the marriage.
Is it at all possible that what is attributed to a "marriage covenant" (No where defined in scripture) is actually derived from the expectations of God for his people?
For example: Provision is frequently included in vows, but even if it wasn't, it would still be required from God's word. Right?
Exo 21:10
If he takes another wife to himself, he shall not diminish her food, her clothing, or her marital rights.
So that obligation doesn't begin with a covenant with the woman, but with God.
For example: Provision is frequently included in vows, but even if it wasn't, it would still be required from God's word. Right?
Exo 21:10
If he takes another wife to himself, he shall not diminish her food, her clothing, or her marital rights.
So that obligation doesn't begin with a covenant with the woman, but with God.
For believers who understand the roles of man and woman it doesn’t make it irrelevant. My point is that there has to be an agreement to enter into a marriage. Both parties need to know they are committing to marriage. The exact details of what is written, spoken, or implied do not matter. God defined the requirements in scripture and he expects the two of them to keep his commandments.
This is exactly what I’m saying.
Great I think we're coming to a point of agreement. Now we're just talking semantics.
So what is a covenant?
David and Jonathan had a covenant, but no Christian would argue that they are married. So a covenant is not, in and of itself, a marriage.
1 Samuel 18:3
Then Jonathan made a covenant with David, because he loved him as his own soul.
Then Jonathan made a covenant with David, because he loved him as his own soul.
As in every covenant recorded in the Bible, David and Jonathan "made a covenant". That is to say it was mindful and willfully entered into by both parties. It's never something stumbled into between equals.
We don't have any record of a man and a woman entering a similar covenant before (or after) a marriage. If there is a case, no one has introduced it to this thread.
Man has added many things to marriage, like rings, rituals, and documents, but are any of these add-ons Biblical?
Not all traditions are bad. They simply should never be elevated to a place of judgment over the Word or given the authority of 'thus sayeth the Lord.'